Month: January 2017

Happy hump day! Half way to the weekend.. although there is very little difference between week days and weekends when you’re a stay at home mum! Especially since DaddyD won’t be home this weekend. But we will enjoy anyway! It’s a quiet, sunny day here and I am relaxing whilst BabyLD naps.

So I will start with the negative 👎🏻 Tuesday came and I got a text AND a phone call to say the new bed was being delivered! After Friday’s failed attempt I was excited to finally get the bed.. and as I saw the guys lifting it off the lorry I was excited, until I saw the look of concern crossing their face. Delivery man looked at me and said “I’m really sorry” and my heart dropped! So half the bed had arrived with a huge rip in the fabric as well as a cut in the wood! How can I be so unlucky?! Anyway Delivery man left the bed so I have a bed to sleep on rather than a mattress on the floor and I got it in writing that they will replace the broken half. Hopefully soon! 😢

Anyway more onwards and upwards! A friend told me that her baby and her loves butternut squash. We have never tried it, and since we are trying lots of new foods now, it seemed a good time. When looking at how to cook butternut squash it seemed a whole lot of effort to prepare but it turned out quite easy. Once chopping it up, pealing off the skin and removing the seeds I boiled it in a pan with 2 table spoons of free from butter, a cup of water and 5 pealed, cored and chopped up apples. 30 minutes later I added some to my dinner then puréed the rest for BabyLD and well, it was LOVELY 😃! BabyLD loved his butternut squash and apple purée. So if you have never tried it, then do!

So BabyLD has been forming friendships with our pets these last few days. When he was having a easy finger food snack of Apple Rice cakes, he noticed that Dog was watching him and he reached into his lunch box, took out a rice cake and handed it to Dog! He appears to have learnt young that the way to Dogs heart is through his stomach! 👶🏻 ❤️ 🐶

Dog then tried to return the favour by sharing his bone with BabyLD by putting it into his sensory basket.

BabyLD has also carried on the same lesson with the Rats today and shared his left over coconut cheese with them! BabyLD loves watching the Rats and he even got licks on the finger by RatY. 👶🏻 ❤️ 🐁🐭

So whilst BabyLD is still sleeping I will curl up on the couch with Dog and watch My newest Tv addiction- Reign. 😁

So it’s been a long fortnight with just BabyLD, Dog and I. We hope DaddyD will be home tomorrow. BabyLD has been really suffering with teething (all his little toothy pegs are pushing against the gum but not a single one has cut!) a cold and night Terrors so there’s been lots of screaming, crying and General gruppyness. Luckily there have still been some lovely moments in between too but I have not spoken face to face with another adult in 9 days now.. well apart from two minutes talking to the post office lady last Friday. Whilst BabyLD watches Pingu, I take a breather, and when he turns to look at me I luckily still have the energy to smile and cuddle him.. where does this energy come from? Is this a skill that just arrives when you have children? Can someone try turning me off and on again? Maybe if I’m reset I can be bubbly and ready for life with my beautiful boy again. Atleast dog walks help clear my head.

The endless washing machine issues: well… we had the fifth appointment to get our washing machine fixed on Monday, and just like before the guy didn’t even turn up! I phoned them and as usual got totally fobbed off my a smart talking woman who said she would call me back, and hung up feeling like I’d just been played. Did she call back? Of course not! I hunted around online for an email address, I’m much better at getting my point across in writing, and found one for the head of customer service. I sent a very long email detailing all their downfalls, the many ways in which they had failed their own code of conduct, and the fact I now have a very eczma ridden baby on steroid cream because he is having to wear disposables as I have no way to wash my cloth nappies! Anyway, he replied very quickly and very apologetically, angry at his own company for how they have treated us, and the next thing I know I have the manager phoning me and a different, reliable engeneer coming out on Friday. Feeling quite proud of myself about this and fingers crossed they are good to their word and I’m finally able to wash my clothes again!

So food wise has been pretty normal and easy this week, foods BabyLD has tried for the first time are: spaghetti hoops, baked beans, beef and marmite. He loved them all! Marmite on toast!
This picture from yesterday’s dinner sums up our general week though:

Atleast I stopped the plate hitting the floor though… just had less to purée and freeze for another day!

It’s Sunday evening, DaddyD has gone away for 2 weeks with work, BabyLD is sound asleep in his cot and I’m relaxing with a cup of tea, some crispy coconut rolls and a Yankee candle! What a weekend it’s been!

Dreams (the company we brought a new bed from) failed to deliver our bed, turning up with the wrong bed.. so we are currently left with a new mattress on the floor. Not a problem as they have now given us some money back and promised to deliver the bed on Tuesday. The mattress is very comfy and I’m atleast enjoying being able to sleep on that but since it’s so low, Dog thinks it’s a new bed for him! Now Dog use to be allowed sneaky cuddles on the bed.. but we decided he wouldn’t be allowed on the new bed. So for the past two days he has snuck up at every opportunity when we are not paying attention and it has been a constant battle! In the end he waited until BabyLD was asleep on the mattress and quietly snuck up next to him, knowing I wouldn’t shout at him or push him down for fear of waking BabyLD! Dog: 1 MummyD: 0 Sigh! Out smarted by a dog… he ended up staying up when BabyLD was awake too! Heyho, there’s no denying they are cute together.
I felt like I was cursed however when not only did my bed turn up wrong, but the man coming to fix my washing machine also failed to turn up! Our washer dryer has been broken for 5 weeks now, it just won’t turn on. 4 weeks ago they sent someone out to confirm that yes we had turned the switch on at the wall and no we aren’t lying, it won’t turn on. He ordered the parts it needed (new motherboards) and said he would return the next week. He did, with the wrong parts… the next week, same thing: the company had again sent him the wrong parts. This week we do not know if he had the right parts or not, he just didn’t turn up! Needless to say many phone calls have been made to different parts of the company and some harsh words said, and now we must wait till tomorrow for them to phone us back with (hopefully) a solution… a new washing machine would be nice! Not only does BabyLD go through atleast one outfit change a day due to babysick, atleast 5 bibs a day due to drooling, but since he is now unable to wear his cloth nappies that nicely contained his poo causing no explosions, he is having to wear disposables and we are having to change numerous vests during the week due to poonarmies! Oh the joys! My house is being taken over by my laundry pile! Atleast we were donated loads of clothes when he was born or it would be costing me a bomb at the laundrette!!

Anyway.. onwards to – nicer topic, highlights (and lowlights) of the weekends food! We have tried some lovely (and some not so lovely) new foods this weekend! BabyLD had his first taste of meat on Friday night – some chicken puréed in with some pasta and carrot which went down a treat, and was followed happily by some soya yoghurt mixed with a fruit pouch:

As a dairy eater I would never normally buy soya yoghurt for myself, but after a sneaky taste of BabyLDs yoghurt, I discovered it’s actually really nice! Watch your yoghurts BabyLD! MummyD might pinch some! 😂

Saturdays dinner was a potentially lovely Chicken with rice and green beans recipe I found in Annabel Karmel’s Baby & Toddler Meal Planner:

I adjusted the meal slightly to include the chicken stock I had made rather than apple juice, and adjusted quantities so that DaddyD and I could have some too with our own chicken (Chinese chicken drumsticks and thighs from Asda, yum!) and blended the beans into the rice. All looked great… until our first mouthful… it’s safe to say it was a disaster, mainly because although I had followed the recipe and the instructions on the bag of rice (which matched) the rice was undercooked. My bad! Why do I always fail (in different ways each time) when I try and cook rice?! The flavour was nice enough but nothing special, so I don’t think we will be trying that one again! Heyho, we had our chicken and BabyLD had a fruit pouch instead lol.

Luckily today was a much better food day.

Sunday morning breakfast was a highlight however! DaddyD is a pancake God and often makes pancakes for weekend breakfasts so I decided to try out a dairy free pancake mix for BabyLD, whilst DaddyD made us adults some buttermilk pancakes. I got the Dairy free recipe from the Nutramigen parents guide, so it uses Nutramigen milk but I’m sure these would work with any milk substitute or even with milk. They were so easy to make and BabyLD loved his dairy free banana pancakes so we all started the day with happy tummies!

For our lunch we had some cheese spred on toast. I decided to have a taste of BabyLDs cheese spread and was suprised to find that I really enjoyed it! More happy tummies all round!

Since DaddyD had left before Sunday Dinner, I decided to skip a roast and we had pasta, cheese sauce and cauliflower. I used a portion of previously made cheese sauce, again from the Nutramigen parents guide:

And decided to blend the pasta and sauce but give the cauliflower baby led weening style. BabyLD seems to enjoy having both spooned purée and fingerfoods during one meal. BabyLD loved the cheese sauce last time so I had high hopes for this meal, until he started gagging the second the sauce on the spoon touched his lips! No idea what got into him but as I had added pepper to my cheese sauce I thought, hey no harm in trying… and added a tiny amount of pepper to his food. Well it was like I had added fairy dust! The meal he had been gagging at was suddenly the best thing he had ever tasted! I will never understand babies! But here he is enjoying his food:

Good thing his cute!

Wow that turned out longer than I expected, well I hope you enjoyed it and I’ve given some of you some useful ideas and recipies!

I have also used old breast milk storage bags. These are not reusable and you have to defrost and put food into a bowl before you heat it but if you have them laying around then why not use them hey?

I have found each way useful for different things so will review each.

Fill n squeeze

I picked this amazing device up at the baby show when I was pregnant And waited almost a year to try it out! The concept is basic, when you have made and puréed food, you put it in the pot and plunge it down and it goes into the pouches, which can be washed out and reused! It does come with a masher too which I’ve not yet used as all BabyLDs food is blended at the moment but I’m sure it will be useful. You can write on these pouches with a white board pen (they sell one on their site) but I find this does rub off easy and I often use a permi pen and just scrub it off with baby wipes (must be ones that contain alcahol – BabyLD’s water wipes don’t work) when needed.

The first time I used this was with home made carrot and parsnip Purée and after easily half filling one pouch (he only needs small portions at the moment, I moved onto a second pouch to continue and suddenly it wouldn’t work! I got quite frustrated that I had somehow broken it in just one use until I realised it was a tiny bit of parsnip stuck in the tube! New to making purée I had not blended it enough. I added more boiled water and blended some more till the parsnip was more smooth and continued with no more problems.

I have successfully used this to make pouches up of a variety of vegetable and fruit purées, as well as roast dinners (including his Christmas and New Year’s Day dinners!) as well as a variety of flavours of Soya and coconut yoghurts (meaning that I can buy the big pots of these and make my own flavours for him, since BabyLD is the only dairy free one in the family and could never eat a whole pot!)

Any issues?

The pouches are not the easiest thing to wash, but once I purchased the pouch scrubber they sell I was much more confident that I was getting them clean enough.

NO lumps will fit through

The pot stained orange after I used it with carrot. Whilst this is not a problem it made me sad as it was the first time i used it! It could be because the purée was still warm when I used it? or because I didn’t rinse straight away? Unsure as to why this happened but it has been hand washed and dishwasher washed many times since and is still a pale shade of orange!

Best used for:

Yoghurts (especially if baby is dairy free!)

fruit purée

Traveling

Weening pots with trays

These little plastic pots are really useful for first portion sizes as you begin weening! They are a simple as it comes, little plastic pots which you spoon food into and trays in which they sit in in the freezer. I have used them for my vegetable purées, fruit purées, and for sauces.they come with stickers to write what is inside. These are great for first use but not washable. I tend to use either a white board pen or a permi pen (which can be rubbed off with a baby wipe after washing – must be ones that contain alcahol though as BabyLD’s water wipes don’t work) to write on them instead.

As I have experiemented with cooking I find these little plastic pots for storing seperate components such as sauces, and vegetable purées which I then defrost and mix with freshly cooked pasta to make a meal for BabyLD. Whilst the trays seem like a good idea whilst you first get these pots, in all fairness I rarely use them and find the pots stack nicely on top of each other in my freezer which takes up much less space!

One point to add is make sure the outside of the pot has no spilled purée on before you freeze! I made this mistake with a tiny droplet of carrot which froze onto the pot.. not a problem until I microwaved from frozen and it melted a hole into the pot! I have no idea how this happened because surely if the food did this it should melt from inside out but oh well!

Any issues?

One pot with a hole in after food spilt on the outside melted through the pot when defrosting (see above for more info)

The lids often don’t stay shut. I solve this problem with either sellotape or stickers.

Best used for:

Portions of sauce – especially if Baby is only dairy free member of family and needs own sauce or you are making reduced salt sauce for them.

Making purées of a good (small) portion size for first weening.

Seperate components of a meal to mix and match.

Ice cube trays and freezer bags

This is the third main method I use for freezing BabyLDs food. I brought this ice cube tray due to the fact it has a lid and I wanted to ensure less spillage whilst transferring to the freezer but any ice cube tray would work.

All you have to do is transfer the food into the sections of the tray and put it in the freezer. Once the food is frozen you can then A) leave it in the tray until you want to use it, or B) transfer the cubes into food bags and store in the freezer in these. I use option B as it means I can then reuse the ice cube tray!

The first time I attempted this was with Apple and pear and I filled half the tray with each. Filling the tray was fairly easy using one of BabyLD’s spoons and it froze fairly quickly. As I came to remove the cubes I found it wasn’t as easy as I expected it to be and I thought for a moment they were stuck in there for good and it was a waste of good food, but with a little effort and wiggling of the tray I managed to remove the cubes and can now mix and match different amounts of the two fruits as I desire. This is really useful for adding a cube of apple to BabyLD’s porridge or to make different flavoured purées quick and easy.

Any issues?

More fiddly than the other methods

Not suitable if freezing meals for an older baby due to small size

Best used for:

Portions of sauce – especially if Baby is only dairy free member of family and needs own sauce or you are making reduced salt sauce for them.

Seperate fruit purées which can be mixed and matched to create a range of tastes with minimal effort

Making purées of a good (small) portion size for first weening.

Conclusion:

Well there we have it! As mentioned above I use all three of these methods for a range of different purposes but I have to say my favourite, especially for yoghurts/ fruit purées is the Fill n squeeze, and I find the weening pots very useful as a mum to a baby with Cows Milk Protien allergy for freezing bulk made dairy free sauces which I can just add to his pasta whilst adding dairy containing sauce to mine!

It’s a new year, and as I lay here on a mattress on the floor (because our new bed that was due to be delivered yesterday failed to arrive- the sent two halves off different coloured divan beds and didn’t even notice till we pointed it out!?) and BabyLD naps beside me, I have finally worked up the courage to start this blog!

Me and my husband are 30 year old first time parents to a now 6 month Baby boy (BabyLD) and we have a 7 year old Black mouth Cur Dog (Dogface) who was a rescue dog and has been with us for almost 4 years now. Dogface is like having a toddler, for example the other night BabyLD slept through, but Dogface had me up all night because he had trapped wind! We have some amusing and crazy times between the two of them!

At 4 months old BabyLD reacted badly to his first bottle of formula and we discovered he is alergic to Dairy! I am a cheese addict and since he was breast fed till then this came as a huge shock to me! We weened him at 5 months due to being advised to do so on the advice of his peadiatric dietitian, I do not advocate for early weening, I just did as I was advised by professionals for my child and every child is different. I will share in this blog our trials and errors In the dairy free world, alongside our adventures with weening and all other things baby, dog and life related we discover along the way! This blog is about our life and experiences and is no way wrItten to give advice to anyone.